The Rooftop Beekeeper by Megan Paska

New Cookbook

The angle: You don't need to own a farm — or even have a back yard! — to raise bees.

Recipes for right now: [While this book is mostly a how-to guide to beekeeping, they do include a few honey recipes!] Best-Ever Honey and Olive Oil Granola with Sea Salt, Milk and Honey Oat Bread, Honey and Soy-Glazed Duck Breast, Clove and Honey Orange Marmalade, Healing Honey Salve

Who would enjoy this book? Urban homesteaders with dreams of honey bees.

Quick Facts

• Who wrote it: Megan Paska

• Who published it: Chronicle Books

• Other highlights: Hoo boy! If you have dreamed a dream of having your own honey bees but mourned the fact that your urban location lacked any real space to keep hives, then this book might literally make your dreams come true. It covers everything from why you might want to keep bees in the first place and the anatomical breakdown of the worker bee to the different styles of bee hives (who knew?) and keeping your urban hive healthy throughout the seasons.

This feels like a very real and practical guide to urban beekeeping. It's sassy and smart, but it also don't overly glorify the realities of keeping bees. There are lots and lots of photos throughout the book that illustrate key steps or give you a visual reference for something being talked about in the text.

Even if you're not interested in beekeeping itself but just want to know more about how bees do their thing and make honey, this feels like an interesting and engaging read!

Find the book at your local library, independent bookstore, or Amazon: The Rooftop Beekeeper by Megan Paska

Apartment Therapy Media makes every effort to test and review products fairly and transparently. The views expressed in this review are the personal views of the reviewer and this particular product review was not sponsored or paid for in any way by the manufacturer or an agent working on their behalf. However, the manufacturer did give us the product for testing and review purposes.

Emma is the recipe editor for The Kitchn and a graduate of the Cambridge School for Culinary Arts. She is the author of True Brews and Brew Better Beer (Spring 2015). Check out her personal blog for more cooking stories.